Monday, March 22, 2010

Entrepreneurs continually come to me seeking seed stage funding but most angel and venture capital groups require at least a prototype and some revenue just to prove out the business model. For those seeking seed stage funding there’s a new category of incubator/accelerator/startup assistance. Here in Austin, the Capital Factory fills that area with their four month long program in which they take in 5 startups and mentor them into fundable deals.

I recently asked Josh Baer what will be new this year. He indicated that they have three new mentors to add to the roster. The new mentors include the following:

Rony Kahan co-founded Indeed.com in 2004 and has grown it into the leading global search engine for jobs with over 25 million monthly unique visitors. Prior to Indeed, Rony co-founded jobsinthemoney.com, the leading job site for financial professionals in 1998 and sold it to Financial News in 2003.

Samy Aboel-Nil was most recently the technical co-founder of MessageOne, responsible for product definition, product strategy, business development for key channel partners, and sales engineering. MessageOne managed well over a million corporate mailboxes before being acquired by Dell Computer in 2008.

Kenny Van Zant is a technology entrepreneur, executive, advisor and board member, with over 20 years of experience with both private and public companies in the Austin area. Mr. Van Zant has been the Senior Vice President and Chief Product Strategist for SolarWinds (NYSE: SWI) since 2006, where he is responsible for the company’s product, market and technology strategy.

If you are seeking seed funding I recommend you investigate the Capital Factory. The Capital Factory is looking for passionate technology entrepreneurs that we can accelerate towards success. You can just have an idea on a napkin or you could have a working product with your first paying customers. Our mentors have started from scratch and found their market fit and they have also scaled their businesses and even taken a few public. Only a few days left to apply. You can apply here.